Great Ocean Road & Grampians Self-Guided Motorcycle Tour

Victoria’s two signature rides in a single weekend. Three days and 840 kilometres from Melbourne, self-guided, taking the Great Ocean Road out and the Grampians and the Goldfields back.

The Great Ocean Road needs no selling. It runs along the base of the cliffs west of Melbourne, climbs through the Otways and reaches the Twelve Apostles, the limestone stacks standing offshore where the Southern Ocean has eaten the coastline away. Early morning and late afternoon are when they look their best, and going self-guided means you can be there for either.

The return leg is the part visitors miss. Inland from the coast the Grampians rise abruptly out of flat farmland, a range of sandstone ridges with good roads threading between them and rock art sites scattered through the park. The Victorian Goldfields follow on the way back to Melbourne, where towns like Ballarat and Bendigo were built on gold in the 1850s and still have the architecture to prove it.

BikeRoundOz provides the bike of your choice, two nights in three and a half to four star hotels, a detailed itinerary document, digital maps and pre-tour route advice, so the planning is done but the pace is not. A pillion stays free on the accommodation, which makes this unusually good value for two. Fuel, meals, park entry and insurance are separate. The season runs September to April. For a first self-guided ride in Australia, or a weekend added onto a trip to Melbourne, it is the obvious place to start.